Many of us spend just over a third of our adult life at work; about 90,000 hours by the time we reach retirement. With all that time spent indoors, it makes sense for our offices to be as environmentally friendly as possible. Here are 5 tips for a greener office!
1: Install an office water filter or water dispenser
It is no secret that we should be drinking 8 glasses of water a day, which means you should drink at least four glasses while at work. Bringing water from home in a stainless steel bottle might be one way, but not many people want to lug a full heavy bottle around.
Everyone in the office should be encouraged to bring their own water bottle, glass, or mug, and don’t forget to have a few spare glasses for customers! You could even up-cycle jam jars, or other sturdy glass jars into great drinking glasses!
2: Green your coffee routine!
Cut costs (and waste!) by replacing single serving coffee makers with drip coffee. There are many tasty fair trade options!
If you can’t convince the other coffee lovers to make the switch, you can replace your single use pods with a refillable alternative. And finally, make sure any single use pods do get recycled.
Avoid single use cups, straws, stirrers, and sugar packets. Many of these are difficult or impossible to recycle.
Speaking of recycling…
3: Set up an office refuse, reduce, reuse, rot, and recycle program
Offices are an ideal place to practice the 5 R’s of conservation and waste management.
- Refuse:
- Don’t print out an email unless absolutely necessary.
- Order takeout without disposable cutlery.
- Reduce:
- When printing, be sure to check the page layout so you don’t end up with only a word or two on the last page.
- Print front & back wherever possible!
- Reduce food waste by going through the canteen fridge often.
- Reuse:
- Turn paper you no longer need into a note pad, mouse pad, or message book.
- Discourage waste by providing reusable plates, bowls, cups, and utensils.
- Rot:
- Composting food waste is one of the easiest ways to reduce your carbon footprint.
- Shredded documents are a great addition to a compost pile or worm farm. Many offices have at least one gardener!
- Coffee grounds make quick compost, as do toilet paper tubes and 100’s of other things!
- Recycle:
- Office waste is often already clean, dry, and ready for the recycling bin. Paperwork, cardboard boxes, bottles of hand-wash, juice cans, water bottles, and washed food containers can all usually be recycled.
Tip:
I know one office with a sneaky way to encourage the 5 R’s: Their trash bin is located OUTSIDE, while all the other items are located in the canteen. This way, recycling, washing and composting become easier than throwing something in the trash.
4: Office Plants
Remember what we said about most offices having a green thumb? Let them put it to good use with a few office plants! Not only do they lively up a sometimes drab space, plants are well known for their ability to clean the air of carbon dioxide and VOC’s. While most of the tests proving this are in a hermetically sealed environment, we still think plants have many tangible benefits.
If you have outdoor space, you could even grow herbs or other plants to benefit the birds and the bees.
5: Save Electricity, Save Resources.
When done right, saving resources can also save you money.
- Save electricity by shutting down computers, and switching off monitors and chargers at night. Don’t forget about coffee machines and air-conditioners!
- Replace conventional bulbs with energy saving ones.
- Use motion sensors so lights are only on when absolutely necessary.
- Use as much natural light as possible.
- On new builds, use water efficient toilets and taps.
- Replace old and broken air-conditioners and other appliances with energy efficient models.
- Adjust your thermostat on a cooler rainy day, or when fewer people are in the office. Consider raising the temperature a few degrees.
Taking sustainability in the office further:
This is just a short list of ideas for a more sustainable work-space. However, building an eco-conscious business can go much further. Every thing we buy and consume has a monetary cost and an environmental cost. Something things are obvious, such as the carbon emissions tied to transportation, others a little harder to quantify, like the type of energy used while producing a commodity.
Environmentally speaking, a circular economy offers great rewards in terms of waste reduction. St Maarten and many of our Caribbean neighbors would benefit by moving away from relying solely on the single pillar economy of tourism.
For more information, please contact us!
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